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Saturday, 20 April 2013

The Language of Altitude

Trying to get the essence of a new language
is exciting. By essence I mean being able to use a few basic and useful words and
phrases like “hello”, “goodbye”, “I would like some really good coffee please”,
“where is the toilet”, and “I need to vomit”. With these five basic phrases you
can get by in almost any situation.

Our first night on the road in the Khumbu Valley. The rooms at
Phakding are basic and un-heated, although they are “ensuite”, which is to say
that there is a tiny bathroom pod that hangs out over a babbling mountain
stream and accommodates a conventional toilet pan, a shower and a basin. Quite
what happens to the waste water from any of these appliances is open to
conjecture. We have our evening meal and relax around an electric fan heater –
the last such decadence we see for the next 12 nights. It is very cold and wet,
and could be miserable if we let it be.

"Our first night on the road." Dramatic backdrop to some
wonderfully basic architecture.

Hari and I start the inevitable – “lets
start speaking Nepalese in twelve minutes flat.” We laugh a lot and I learn
very little, even though I slavishly note down words in my note book. At least
I try, but between my dreadful writing and Haris’ thick accent and his
dreadful writing I end up with a spiders web of dodgy phonetics with lots of
double consonants.

We however sort out “Hallo” – Namaste;
and “Goodbye” – Namaste. Well that’s simple enough and very sensible; an
exchange designed especially for idiot foreigners. “Thank you” is Dhanebhat,
and for some reason this simple word eludes me for days to come and as for
“You’re welcome” (or “it’s an absolute pleasure old chap” in standard English)
which is Suwagatham – if I understand Haris’ script correctly, still
eludes me, although Kevin managed successfully to reduce it to sugarmouth
for convenience.

This intensive language lesson is
happening while Kevin is chatting to a lone (and obviously wealthy) Canadian on
her second gap year and Lavern is
chatting to the owner of the Tea House who is nursing the most endearing
moon-faced child.

Hari and I progress to exchanging kiSwahili
pole pole (the language of Kilimanjaro) for the Nepalese bistari bistari;
both meaning “slowly slowly” and used in the context of moving about at high altitude.
“Tea” is Chiya in Nepalese not so far away from Chi in kiSwahili.
This must be one of the most universal words in the world – other than “Okay”,
a couple of very familiar Anglo-Saxon swear-words, and “Nelson Mandela”.

Phakding "Main Street". Our first stop. Bhim

is skulking in the far doorway. The donkey

has nothing to do with any of us.

“Coffee” is coffee, which is also usefully global.

Then we get onto sex, or should I say
gender. “Woman” is Kate, and “Man” is Manchhe. At least I think
so, because these notes are covered with many crossings out and are largely obscured
by coffee stains. “Baby” is Bachha, - another interesting array of double
consonants. “ I'm fine” is Tichha, and delightfully “Bye Bye” is Ta-ta.

But
it is Manchhe that sticks – or rather Budo Manchhe. Hari says
“You Budo Manchhe.” “No,” I respond “I’m Thaneri Manchhe, like you”
demonstrating my new found command of the Nepalese language and my
understanding of the difference between “young” and “old”. “No, no” he giggles
“No, no, Budo Mancche” and emphasizes his assessment of my age with a painful punch on
the shoulder. Across the room our two porters, Bhim and Junior (not yet known as
Kharabir) grin broadly and obsequiously intone “Budo Manchhe”. And from
then on Budo Manchhe becomes a mantra. I should feel like a god – but have
become an Old Age Pensioner!

En-route between Pangboche and Dingboche trying to take my mind off
breathing I was mentally repeating the Nepalese
words we had come across so far. Not on the face of it a difficult task
given the very few I could remember. Passing a diminutive Sherpa couple each
bowed under a load of vast proportions I cheerfully gasped out “Namche” by way of
greeting. My only defence is that we had been trekking in the neighbourhood of a truly unforgettable place called Namche Bazzar and that this word had
obviously lodged itself firmly in the left hemisphere of my brain and shoved - Namaste - the word of greeting, to one
side.

En-route between Pangnoche and Dingboche . . " The site
of a terrible language faux pas.

This then was the equivalent of greeting
someone in Paris (France) by saying “Paris”, or someone in London (England) by
saying “London”. In the former instance you would be ignored entirely and in
the latter instance you would of course rightly be arrested for gross invasion
of privacy. Say “New York” to someone in New York (USA) and you will be charged
with terrorism and confined to Guantanamo Bay for a life time. Likewise say
“Alice Springs” to someone in Alice Springs (Australia) you could end up with a
very fat lip or a broken jaw.

For me in Nepal the embarrassment was equal
to all the above because there is nothing more mocking than the sound of
derisory tubercular laughter echoing around the mountain fastness of a place, near a place called “Namche” and rightly not called “Namaste".

"Budo Manchhe becomes a mantra" Hari and Bhim hold up
an old age pensioner just before the climb up the "hill" to
Namche Bazzar.